The Smiling Man

By 

Joseph Knox

The Smiling Man, a rather convoluted detective mystery novel, follows Detective Constable Aiden Waits, a seasoned detective through a series of big city crimes including harassment, assault, and even murder.  Waits, an emotionally disturbed individual, with a sordid past, struggles to develop a future in the police department in spite being hated by his superiors and colleagues.  This is Detective Waits second appearance with his first being in Joseph Knox’s debut novel Sirens.

A reported break-in at the closed Palace Hotel turns out to be much more than it first appears.  A body sporting a grotesque smile is found in room 431.  A security guard is found unconscious in the hallway and a shadowy figure exits through the fire escape.  The hotel owners are not cooperative.  The lead lawyer has taken an unexpected holiday for health reasons.  And to make matters worse no one can identify the body.  On top of this Waits is distracted by a sexual harassment case that his superiors want him to forget and by an old enemy reappears but won’t say why.

Aiden Waits is a very complex character.  Knox does a very good job of letting the circumstances surrounding his violent tendencies and drug problems unfold carefully as the story proceeds.  This for me is a highlight of the novel.

Compared to other books in this genre, I find this story very cumbersome.  There are at least three major stories going on at once.  All three can become books on their own.  One has to try to hold on to the multiple characters believing that the stories are linked in the end, but unfortunately this is not the case.  I believe that the multiple storylines and the multitude of characters lead to confusion rather than an intriguing story.   One line of investigation with a handful of suspects is in my opinion plenty.  I lost count of the important characters in this novel.

I do not recommend this book to those who enjoy detective novels, but again want to emphasize that the character of Aiden Waits is interesting.  I give it a 2 on 5.

I want to thank NetGalley and Crown Publishing for providing me with this digital copy in exchange for a fair review.